Polk / O'Farrell Emergency Alert: Tenderloin Vault Fire In Progress

Breaking news, folks. According to Alert SF, "Avoid the area of Polk / O'Farrell for next hour due to fire in underground vault. Heavy smoke. Traffic in area is impacted." Also, as always, you could very well get shot and killed at Polk and O'Farrell, or groped by bachelor party revelers from the nearby O'Farrell Theater, so do be careful

Update 1 p.m.: "No pedestrian or vehicle traffic in area of Polk/OFarrell. Exclusion perimeter: Van Ness - Geary - Larkin - Ellis - Van Ness. NO traffic inside that box." Traffic is a mess. Do NOT go around that area if you can help it.

Update: 1:12 p.m.: Holy smokes! (Heh.) It's a manhole or vault fire. (What's a vault in this case, readers?) Watch it live on KGO.

Update 1:16 p.m.: SFist is coming at you live with breaking info on SFTLVaultFire2K9. According to reports, the "[s]mell in the Tenderloin is [more] awful [than usual]. Traffic lights flashing red on Geary, Larkin, Polk."

Update 1:22 p.m.: Egads, it is ROARING out of control. According to ABC 7, the fire its "due to an explosion of an underground transformer." Shelter is in place for Tenderloing residents. Which is to say, don't go outside right now, TL ilk.

Also, if you're holed up in your apartment, please send pics of said blaze to SFist at [email protected].